She wants Jin on the team? That was interesting. I would have expected her to go with any of the other students we’d known for years.
“I think I can sell him on the idea. Where do I sign up?”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’ll take care of it. I’ve known how to forge your signature for years.”
“Knowledge is distinct from mastery. If your idea of my signature is anything like your homages to the great artists of—”
“I was six when I drew those, Corin. Six! Are you never going to let that go?”
“Not if you keep giving me such perfect reactions.”
“Ugh.”
We made our way to the shops without any further incidents, and she helped me pick out some of the items I needed. Fortunately, I’d just gotten my weekly stipend that morning; otherwise I’d have been begging Sera for a loan. I was only going to make one or two items immediately, but I picked up a handful of mundane accessories for future enchantments for myself, as well as the next few things Jin was going to need.
I had a lot of options in mind for my first item, even with my relatively limited resources.
In terms of function, I had a few main things I wanted to focus on.
First, I needed to make sure I stayed intact. My shield sigil was a good start for this, especially because I could recharge it myself, but eventually I wanted something that was stronger and wouldn’t require any upkeep from my side.
It also had a clear weakness to kinetic energy. Most shielding spells seemed to dampen the force of physical attacks, but failed to stop them entirely. I’d need to research how to counter that. Maybe a transference-based shield spell?
I also needed more raw offensive power. When Professor Orden had broken into my room, her tunic had been able to effortlessly absorb my dueling cane’s blasts. Maybe she wasn’t a fair bar to set. I couldn’t expect to beat opponents with Emerald-level enchantments that caught me by surprise in a fair fight, but even my own humble shield sigil was capable of soaking about fifteen hits from a standard dueling cane before failing.
Presumably, that was why Lord Teft had felt comfortable letting us throw spells at each other on our first day of class. The sigil defenses were more than capable of stopping anything your average student could have produced. Sera’s summoning-based attack spell might have broken through a shield, but I really had no idea. It was visually impressive, but I didn’t know how much punch those shards of ice had.
If I couldn’t break a simple shield, I couldn’t be expected to handle any monster of significant power, either. My sword might have done the job, but I still didn’t know exactly how it worked, and I wasn’t going to get into close range with anything threatening if I could avoid it. I had just enough sword training to know that there were plenty of people who were better.
Information gathering was another high priority. I still had access to multiple items that I couldn’t even properly identify, which meant that I couldn’t use them to the height of their capabilities. Besides identifying items, I also wanted anything that would help give me clues on how to solve the multitude of puzzles inside the tower, or otherwise help me make my way through. Maybe I could eventually find spells to locate other people? I’d need to do some research on that. I knew practically nothing about the capabilities and limitations of divination.
Finally, I wanted some items to improve my mobility. Things that would let me safely traverse tower rooms with gaping chasms and spinning blades. Teleportation was the most obvious choice, followed by things that would simply increase my speed or agility. Flight could be useful, too, if I could manage it.
From those broad options, I came up with a short list of things I could actually make. A better shield sigil was an option, and there were types listed in the Advanced Artifice book — which I probably needed to return to the library at some point — that were designed to stop kinetic attacks. They were all listed as at least “Carnelian” level, but they didn’t look difficult.
In terms of firepower, there were a lot of options. Mages, unsurprisingly, loved researching new and exciting ways to explode things just as much as anyone else. I found a lot of runes dedicated to variations on dueling canes — ones that fired elemental bolts instead of gray mana, for example, or that had specialized enhancements for attacks. Bolts that homed in on enemies, for example, or blasted through basic shielding.
A lot of these options were probably within my capabilities, but they were also common, and that meant there would be accessible defenses against them. They’d still be perfectly viable in the tower, but I wanted something I could use if I was attacked by another human that was potentially more experienced than I was. That meant something less obvious… maybe an enchanted ring?
I shelved that idea for the moment, looking at the other categories.
For information gathering, I found several enchantments for interfacing with other enchantments, like how my sigil detected other projectiles. I found very few detection spells that could be used on their own, though. Most of the divination enchantments I’d looked up for Jin were only useful in specific situations — things like seeing in the dark, detecting ambient mana, and seeing through walls. I really wanted something that would give me information about magical items, but I didn’t find anything like that in my books. I’d have to ask a more experienced Enchanter about it later.
Mobility was almost entirely out of my reach. I could make an enchantment to increase the height I could jump, but not a lot else. Even increasing my running speed would require several runes I didn’t have listed in my books. Apparently, just adding mobility by itself would add force to my motions without any stability, so I’d basically be blasting myself forward with each step. Hilarious, but impractical.
So, all in all, blowing things up seemed best.
I’d picked up a couple cheap rings, but a bit of study told me they wouldn’t work on their own. An item’s mana capacity was based on its size and materials, and a simple metal band couldn’t hold much of anything.
Gems could hold a great deal, but there were two problems with that. One, I couldn’t afford any decent gems. Two, I didn’t know how to inscribe them with runes properly. Etching metal was easy. Drawing on the surface of a diamond? I wasn’t sure, but that sounded a lot harder.
So, what else was easily concealed and potentially a good source for directing attack magic? Necklaces had the same problems as rings, and also the magic would emanate directly from the item. I couldn’t aim my neck very well. Really, that last part meant I needed either something hand-held or something on my hand. I was back to dueling canes…or maybe a glove?
Standard cloth and leather gloves had terrible mana capacities, too, as it turned out. There were specialized types of materials that could hold a lot of mana, but they were well outside my price range.
Gauntlets, on the other hand? Those could hold a fair bit of mana, and I could easily afford a pair. I was worried that a traditional gauntlet would impede my ability to manipulate anything with my hands, though, so I settled on a demi-gauntlet that I’d wear with a leather glove underneath.
“So, whatcha doing?”
I’d made the mistake of asking Sera to watch me work on this enchantment, since it was technically Carnelian-level and I wasn’t precisely allowed to be trying it yet. There was only a tiny chance I’d detonate the gauntlet in the process, and I was pretty sure my shield would save me. Probably.